NORFOLK, Va. (AP) — Devising a way to one day land astronauts on Mars is a complex problem and NASA scientists think something as simple as a child's toy design may help solve the problem. Safely landing a large spacecraft on the Red planet is just one of many engineering challenges the agency faces as it eyes an ambitious goal of sending humans into deep space later this century.

At NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, engineers have been working to develop an inflatable heat shield that looks a lot like a super-sized version of a stacking ring of doughnuts that infants play with. The engineers believe a lightweight, inflatable heat shield could be deployed to slow the craft to enter a Martian atmosphere much thinner than Earth's.

Scientists often test drugs in mice. Now some cancer patients are doing the same — with the hope of curing their own disease.

They are paying a private lab to breed mice that carry bits of their own tumors so treatments can be tried first on the customized rodents. The idea is to see which drugs might work best on a specific person's specific cancer.

BERLIN (AP) — There is a strong chance Europe's comet lander will wake up from hibernation as it nears the sun, raising hopes for a second series of scientific measurements from the surface next year, scientists involved in the mission said Monday.

BERLIN (AP) — A European probe has begun drilling into a comet to collect scientific data, but mission controllers said Friday that battery issues may make it impossible — at least for now — to access that information.

BERLIN (AP) — Europe's comet lander Philae has come to rest in the shadow of a cliff, posing a potential problem for its solar panels, scientists from the European Space Agency said Thursday as they published its first image from the surface of a comet.

DARMSTADT, Germany (AP) — Hundreds of millions of miles from Earth, a speeding European spacecraft released a lander toward the icy, dusty surface of a comet on Wednesday, setting off a seven-hour countdown to an audacious attempt to answer some of the biggest questions about the origin of the universe.

Drugmakers are racing to develop vaccines and drugs to address the worst outbreak of Ebola in history. It's unclear who will pay for their products, but companies are betting that governments and aid groups will foot the bill.

There are no proven drugs or vaccines for Ebola, in large part because the disease is so rare that up until now it's been hard to attract research funding. And the West African nations hardest hit by the outbreak are unlikely to be able to afford new Ebola vaccines and drugs.

CUPERTINO, Calif. (AP) — Apple Inc. is expected to unveil new iPads at an event Thursday, as the company tries to drive excitement amid slowing demand for tablet computers. Apple may also announce a new Mac operating system and possibly new Mac computers. Watchers also await a possible launch date for Apple Pay, the company's new system for using iPhones to make credit and debit card payments at retail stores.